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Date Published: 16/11/2015

ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November

No getting away from Cataluña this week, Spanish solidarity for Paris murders and Spanish property prices rising once again

A nip of Autumn assailed the Murcia Region this week, the office window closing for the first time in months on Thursday. Last night the north and north-west (Caravaca de la Cruz and Yecla) dropped down to 4 and 6 degrees, coastal areas remaining around 12 degrees, although daytime temperatures are still up in the mid twenties: Cartagena 20 degrees, Lorca 23 and Murcia at 25 today.

Autumn Mediaeval market season is well underway, hot chestnuts, BBQ ribs and roasted sweet potatoes a treat for those weary of scented bags for the wardrobe and bracelets, Cartagena this last weekend kicking off the offering, with Lorca, Totana and then Caravaca to follow swiftly afterwards.

There’s been very little in the way of news this week in Murcia. With national elections just over a month away campaigning is in full swing, although most of the debate which is obsessing the Spanish language media at the moment will be of no interest whatsoever to most expats as we’re not permitted to vote in this particular set of elections, even though businesses in particular will be affected by the outcome.

Here in Murcia coverage has once again centred around the regional budget, which has been now approved by the Murcian regional government, although is still pending agreement from the regional assembly. This has been a rocky road, the PP one seat short of a majority so depending on the votes of Ciudadanos to push through the budget. However, C’s have refused to back the government with their votes until all indicted politicians have resigned from their positions. One of these obstacles may have been cleared out of the way this week, after the council in Torre Pacheco took matters into its own hands and a coalition of opposing parties joined together to pass a vote of no ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November confidence in their PP Mayoress, who had been indicted for allegedly appointing a financial controller without putting the job out for public applications, replacing her with an independent Mayor and an independent – PSOE coalition instead of a PP council.

Parliamentary investigation into Corvera airport underway
This week the new regional parliament committee which has been set up to investigate the government’s role in the saga of the new airport in Corvera officially began work on Wednesday, with its brief being to look into “the decisions made by the regional government regarding the award of the construction contract, the 182-million-euro bank guarantee provided and the condition of an infrastructure which is not currently in use”.

With winter flight schedules now underway there is a noticeable reduction in the number of flights coming in via San Javier, and several readers have emailed commenting that with the loss of Jet2 services from East Midlands next summer, they now have no choice other than to fly to Alicante from their habitual airports. How quickly the situation at Corvera can be resolved depends on not only the resolution of the current situation regarding the former concessionary, but also the outcome of the General Elections in December, continuance of the same personnel at a national level preferable for the smooth progress of negotiations to having to start all over again with a different set of people and alternative political agenda. We’ll just have to wait until the beginning of 2016 to see what happens.

More space debris
Following the discovery of a first piece of space debris in Mula last week, witnesses came forward claiming to have ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November seen “seven or eight” streaks of light heading towards the north-west of Murcia, since when two further pieces of debris have turned up, both in the Calasparra area. A strange lump of metal was also found just over the border in Alicante, which investigators now believe has fallen off an aircraft rather than a satellite or rocket, and another lump of what is believed to be space debris has also turned up in Cuenca, just above the region, in Castilla La Mancha.

Meanwhile a stash of dynamite and other materials used in the fabrication of explosive devices has been confiscated and destroyed by the Guardia Civil after it was discovered at a rural house in the municipality of Ricote. The materials dated back to the 1950’s when the husband of the property owner was a “cabuquero”, a man whose job it was to blow up large rocks which lay in the middle of crop fields, but with the changes made in legislation regarding explosive devices this profession has now disappeared.

Agriculturalists facing fines for Mar Menor mud
On five occasions when there has been significant rainfall over the last few months, council workers have been sent ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November in to clear mud and water from the streets, gardens, underbuilds and commercial premises in Los Nietos and Mar de Cristal.

While property owners and other residents await a permanent solution, Cartagena council has said this week that if and when it is proven that the cause of the flooding is the modifications made to the agricultural land lying behind these settlements on the coast of the Mar Menor, then not only will the landowners be obliged to return the landscape to its original form, but they will also be obliged to pay for the clean-up costs incurred by the Town Hall and local contractors who have been called in to spray off the streets and make sure drainage channels are clear of mud.

In Los Alcázares meanwhile, ex-pat residents have continued their initiative to clear up rubbish dumped locally at their own expense, determined to ensure their local environment is an attractive one in which to live.

Tourism plans moving forward.
The Mazarrón municipality has announced this week that after extensive consultation a panel of experts has recommended that the Phoenician wreck lying beneath the waters just off the Playa de la Isla in the Puerto de ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November Mazarrón be lifted from the seabed. Ever since the wreck was first discovered the debate has been raging as to how to best conserve this 2700 year old vessel. Mazarrón council is determined that it should remain within the municipality and wants to see it conserved and displayed in a museum as close to the beach where it was found as possible, although others would prefer to see it on show in Cartagena, where there is currently a reproduction in the ARQUA subaquatic museum. The boat will now undergo further testing, with a view to lifting it at the beginning of 2017 and building a new museum in which the remains can be housed after conservation.

Meanwhile in the north-west of the region, work is now ready to begin conditioning a stretch of the Via Verde del Noroeste in the Mula municipality, improving the walking/cycling route running from Murcia to Caravaca de la Cruz. Caravaca is now preparing for its Año Santo in 2017, a Holy Year granted by the Pope every seven years, which makes Caravaca de la Cruz one of only five holy cities in the world.

The contract has also been adjudicated for the 15km stretch which passes through the Mazarrón municipality of the former Totana-Cartagena railway line, which is also being conditioned as a Via Verde walking/cycling route, adding another tourist attraction for the local area.

Meanwhile, the regional tourist board has been busy in Scandinavia, attempting to increase the volume of tourists from this area to bridge the off-season gap and boost expenditure during the winter months. The Scandinavians are the second most important group of tourists (after the British) for Murcia and have spent 77 million euros here in the first nine months of this year.

Murcia Property news
Property Registrars presented their third quarter figures last week with good results for Murcia. During the quarter there were 3,149 sales registered in the Murcia Region, with the 20% increase in comparison to the previous three months being the most significant among all of the country’s 17 regions. At the same time, this total was 18% higher than in the third quarter of 2014, and the running 12-monthly total of 10,660 is now 11.3% up on the equivalent a year ago.

Spanish national news
With the country immersed in pre-election campaigning, non-political news last week was thin on the ground, the media absolutely dominated by the secessionist issue in Cataluña throughout the week, and the terror attacks in Paris over the weekend.

Catalunya
Last week the Catalan Parliament declared its intention to pass a motion setting Catalunya on the road to declaring ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November itself an independent Republic within 18 months, and was warned by the Spanish government that should they do so, the move would be immediately blocked by the courts.

Ignoring the warning, the Catalan parliament voted to support the motion of independence on Monday, so Spains government immediately filed an appeal with the Constitutional Court on Tuesday which was entered on Wednesday, suspending the declaration.

"This is not just a reaction to a motion passed in parliament, this is about defending a whole country," Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said, insisting that the north-eastern region would not be allowed to split from Spain under any circumstances, the stance maintained by the Spanish government since the Spanish Constitution was created following the death of General Franco in 1975.

Agreeing to hear the appeal of the Spanish government, and suspending the motion passed by the regional parliament, the court warned those who were supporting the motion that "this is a warning to (Catalan leaders) that if they fail to comply with the suspension, they may commit civil disobedience," the ruling by the Madrid-based high court read.

21 leading politicians, including Artur Mas and parliamentary Speaker Carmen Forcadell were informed by the courts directly of the judicial consequences of any “disobedience”, which could include fines of up to 30,000 euros and even prison sentences.

All have said that they will disregard the order and continue on the course already established.

However, for the Catalan regional government the most pressing problem is the election of a new leader, which again, is entwined with the separatist issue.

There have been two sessions of voting this week and in both of them the candidacy of Artur Mas has been rejected.
The pro-independence Junts pel Si (Together for Yes) led by Mas, gained 62 seats in the local elections held during September, which, added to the 10 seats won by the far-left CUP, would give a sufficient majority in the regional parliament should these two separatist parties vote together on a separatist agenda.

However, the CUP refuses to invest Artur Mas, ( a combination of factors including his alleged involvement in commissions for contracts corruption and the manner in which independence should be achieved)maintaining that he must stand aside if the separatist groups are to push forward with an agenda for secession in the next four years.

The combined opposition parties lack sufficient votes to elect an alternative candidate, so with the CUP refusing to back Mas, and Mas refusing to stand aside, the result is an inconclusive deadlock. As a result the second round of voting on Thursday was inconclusive and Artur Mas became the first presidential candidate in Catalunya to fail to gain support during both of the first two parliamentary votes.

In an effort to win over the CUP, which also supports the separation of Catalunya from Spain but disagrees with the continuation of Artur Mas as president, an offer was made on Wednesday to designate some of the presidential responsibilities to three vice-presidents, namely Oriol Junqueras, Raül Romeva and Neus Munté, but this proved insufficient to change the minds of the CUP. The CUP maintain that any deal by which Sr Mas is nominated as president will be unacceptable, although they would be willing to contemplate him holding any other office in the regional government.

Sr Mas now has until 9th January to achieve the support of a majority in the regional parliament, and if at that point there has still been no president appointed then another regional election will have to be held in the spring.

The survey released on Friday by the Barcelona-based Centre dEstudis dOpinio (CEO), which is funded by the regional government, showed a new election would produce almost identical results for JpS, with 39.8 percent of the vote compared to 39.6 percent in September while CUP would rise to 11.1 percent from 8.2 percent.

The two parties, which jointly obtained 47.8 percent of the vote in the election on September 27th would now achieve 50.9 percent and between 75 to 79 seats in the 135-strong assembly, up from 72 seats now.

But although the pro-independence camp would gain more votes, a narrow majority of Catalans, or 47.8 percent, still reject a move to separate from the rest of Spain, more than the 46.7 percent in favour, the survey showed.

The row over Catalonia has escalated dramatically just weeks ahead of the General Election in December, and is totally dominating political campaigning, with the media writing about little else all week as the drama unfolded.

Politicians of all parties and from across the country have been united in condemning the situation in Cataluña, along with the international media ( the FT warned of the “folly” of the race for secession and urged both Barcelona ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November and Madrid to act swiftly and decisively to avoid a “dangerous collision“).

Even here in Murcia the Murcian government, supported by all the major political parties in the region, issued a statement defending the unity of Spain and supporting the central government in its stance against the Catalan government. While expressing that “Murcians feel themselves to be Spanish above everything else, “ the statement also went on to support the legitimacy of the law and affirm that the future of Cataluña must be agreed under the legal framework of the Spanish Constitution.

Outside of parliament the battle has continued at council level, two reports coming to light this week of "flag disobedience." Flags have become a popular means of expressing support for the separatist cause and two Catalan councils have been forced by the courts to display Spanish flags on the front of their town halls this week, as is required by Spanish law. One of the two councils defiantly hung an Estellada ( the flag of Cataluña) next to their Spanish flag, whereas the other town hall reluctantly hoisted their flag only to announce its almost immediate "theft" from the front of the town hall just hours afterwards.

Gender violence
Another topic which achieved widespread coverage was the topic of gender violence. Last weekend three women died in incidents of gender violence, a figure which had risen to four by Monday evening. Right across the country town halls held acts of tribute and announced initiatives at a local level to counter domestic violence. However, this weekend three further deaths increased the toll to 48.

Pollution
Both Madrid and Barcelona have suffered from air pollution problems and in Madrid this week the council imposed ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November speed limits and reduced parking availability as measures to minimise the level of contamination in the city centre which had reached pre-determined limits. By the end of the week the restrictions had been removed, but long-term the council is considering a number of measures to restrict access to the centre of the city and reduce air contamination.

Plans were also presented this week to improve the rail and air connections in the city, creating “Terminal 0” comprising Barajas airport and a remodelled Chamartín station

In the same week a company in Navarra unveiled a new type of concrete flagstone which can absorb traffic pollutants.

Crime

The main story which caught the headlines this week was the decision of the courts to jail both parents of murdered 12 year old Asunta Basterra for 18 years.

Terrorism
The events of Friday evening in Paris have dominated the Spanish media all weekend, with vigils and expressions of ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November solidarity coming from across Spain. Only one Spanish national is now confirmed to have died, although several Spaniards were amongst the injured and three days of official mourning has been declared in many areas including Murcia.

Prime Minister Rajoy is participating in the G-20 summit in Turkey, where he described terrorism as "one of the toughest, bloodiest and most terrible problems we face."

“No ideology, no religion, and no circumstances can warrant the atrocities committed by terrorists," he said, “this is a war between civilization and barbarism."

Sentiments echoed by millions worldwide, united in their condemnation of the murders on Friday night.

As in much of Europe, vigilance in public areas will be increased and border checkpoints manned in collaboration with the French authorities. At the moment, the Interior Ministry has maintained the existing level of terror alert and is holding daily co-ordination meetings to review security measures and analyse the ongoing situation.

Spanish property round-up: Prices and sales figures appear to be on the up again

Once again the news in the Spanish residential property market has been overwhelmingly positive over the last week, and it is at last beginning to seem to even the most pessimistic observers that the future is relatively bright.

In recent months there have been unmistakable signs that the market is becoming more active, although niggling ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish weekly news round-up 15th November worries about prices have remained: it seems that as soon as one set of figures reports price stability, another is published which shows that property values are still falling. The country’s property registrars, though, have now issued their report for the third quarter of this year, and their conclusions are unequivocally positive, with an average price increase across the whole of Spain of 2.25% during the three-month period and 6.6% during the year ending in September. Although the registrars unfortunately don’t enter into any detail regarding the price trend in each of Spain’s 17 regions and 50 provinces, it can be deduced that although there will inevitably variations from area to area, the majority are experiencing an appreciation in the value of residential real estate inflation for the first time in years.

The relative good health of the market is also indicated in the same report by sales figures, which continue to rise and reached over 92,000 during the third quarter. As has become customary, the most important driving forces behind this recovery are the availability of attractively-priced second-hand property, the low Euribor rate and the demand from non-Spanish buyers, and this leads to the most vibrant markets currently being found in the Mediterranean coastal provinces of Alicante, Málaga, Castellón, Girona, Almería, Tarragona and the Balearics.

Foreigners are reported to have accounted for 13.5% of all purchasers during the three months concerned, with almost a quarter of all of these transactions involving buyers from the UK (the next most active nationalities were the French, the Germans, the Swedes, the Belgians and the Italians).

This leading role of the Mediterranean in the Spanish property market recovery is reflected not only in sales figures and demand, but also in supply: one property portal estimates that while in general terms approximately 2.7% of all homes in Spain are currently for sale, in the Mediterranean the proportion is significantly higher, reaching 4.5% in the province of Málaga, 3.7% in both Alicante and the Balearics and over 3% in almost all the provinces which lie along the country’s southern and eastern coast.

Among the knock-on effects of the generalized increase in activity on the property market is the chance for many major banks to improve their cash-flow situation. During the first three quarters of this year Banco Popular has managed to offload over 1,000 properties per month, and in total the “big seven” banks have raised over 5,000 million euros through the sale of residential properties on their portfolios. The resulting revenue from the sale of over 40,000 homes is enabling the banks to concentrate on awarding more mortgages, thus feeding the benefits back into the real estate market.

While the improving figures are without doubt a relief after seven years of doom and gloom, it has to be remembered that both sales figures and prices are still a long way short of where they were in 2007 and 2008. However, in Barcelona it is believed that a new record has been set this month; the rental of a 500-square-metre flat in the city centre has been confirmed by Prestige Barcelona, a subsidiary of Coldwell Banker España, for the tidy sum of 35,000-euros a month. Admittedly the new tenant, a member of one of the royal families in the Middle East, is unlikely to have felt the effects of the economic crisis in the same way as many others, but even so it’s another snippet of positive news in what has undoubtedly been a week of buoyancy for the property market in Spain.

Currency Exchange rate: 100,000 Sterling transferred to Spain now is worth 16,000 euros more than it was a year ago

This week the Pound Euro currency exchange rate increased to over 1.41€

This is the best rate for several months, meaning those who transfer their pensions or buy a property in Spain now are getting more euros for every pound Sterling. This also makes Spanish property even cheaper for those buying with Sterling and pushes the prices even lower. But rates change constantly, so you need to keep an eye on currency rates if you are planning to make a transfer any time soon.

Click for this weeks currency round up showing the exchange rate between Sterling and the Euro.

If you still use a Bank to transfer money, ask our currency experts for a quote to use a money transfer service, youll be amazed how much more you get for your pounds using this method and its really easy to do!

Click here for a No-commitment quote to transfer money to Spain . Find out how much you can SAVE!

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